Boothill Cemetery
Tascosa ghost town
photos by Jeanette Coaly
l Jesse Sheets (?-1886) was killed by an errant bullet during a gunfight; removed to Roswell, NM, cemetery in 1928.
2 John Leverton (?-March 21, 1886) died in a gunfight.
3 Ed King - new headstone
Ed King (1862-March 21 1886) was killed by Lem Woodruff in a gunfight.
4 Frank Valley - new headstone
Frank Valley (1863-March 21 1886) was killed by Lem Woodruff in a gunfight.
5 Fred Chilton - new headstone
Frederick Douglas Chilton (1865-March 21, 1886) was killed by Lem Woodruff in a gunfight; son of William & Elizabeth Chilton.
6 Fred Leigh (?-1880) was killed by Cape Willingham.
7 Bob Russell (?-1879) was killed by Jules Howard in a gunfight; first burial in Boothill Cemetery.
8 Pete "the Dutchman" Fulton was killed by John "Catfish Kid" Gough.
9 Bacilio Sanches was killed by a horse.
10 Frank Norwood was killed by John Maley.
11 John Maley was killed by Ed Norwood, brother of Frank Norwood.
12 Ruben Juice
13 Apple Axe, cook's helper
14 Bill Smith
15 Overton Bounds
16 Ralph Ledbetter
17 Jim Jones
18 Bill Klimm
19 Garl Yowell
20 Bob Luker
21 Unknown adult female died of smallpox.
22 Unknown infants died of smallpox.
23 Jim Sane
24 Hugh Dickey
25 George Findley
26 Ed Morgan
27 Bobby Hughes
Historical Marker: Along with law-abiding and God-fearing men and women were buried here, often without benefit of clergy, men who "died with their boots on". The name was borrowed from a cemetery in Dodge City, Kansas, while it was a resort of buffalo hunters and trail drivers.
History: Old Tascosa, cowboy capital of the plains, lay one-half mile northeast of Boothill Cemetery. In its brief span it became the center of the open-range world. Stamping ground for some of the West's most notorious bad men and focal point for cattle thieves and ranchmen. Because of the easy crossing of the Canadian River at the site, it early became a meeting place where Indians and Mexican traders (comancheros) exchanged contraband goods, including women and children.
With the passing of the buffalo came the first permanent settlement, made by Mexican sheepherders in 1876. Charles Goodnight and Thomas S. Bugbee brought the first cattle to the free-grass empire the same year. Smaller ranchmen and nesters followed and the boom was on.
Hundreds of miles from the general line of settlement, Tascosa lured the lawless and the lawmen: the Billy the Kids and the Pat Garretts. To accommodate those who died with their boots on in growing gunfights, a cemetery was set aside in 1879. It was named for the famed 'Boot Hill' in Dodge City, Kansas, to which Tascosa was tied by cattle and freight trail. Heaviest toll in a single shoot out occurred March 21, 1886, when three cowboys and a restaurant owner died in a five-minute duel. All went to Boot Hill. The cattle trails, Tascosa's lifeblood, began to be pinched off with the coming of barbed wire, first commercial use of which was drawn still tighter when the vast XIT spread fenced its 3 million acres. By 1887 Tascosa was completely closed in. When the railroad bypassed it the same year, its fate was sealed. By the time the Oldham County seat was moved to Vega in 1915, only 15 residents remained. Sole remnants of the old town today are Boot Hill and the stone courthouse. The site, however, is occupied by Cal Farley's Boys Ranch.